I wanted to argue with her, but I couldn’t very well go traipsing about the citadel in my undergarments and a blanket with Halvor there. And besides, much as I hated to admit it, I still felt unnaturally weak, though I wasn’t sure how much was from the effects of the fever, or what was from the lingering guilt over what I’d said to my mother. My legs trembled as I moved over to stand by the window, gripping the blanket around my shoulders to ward off the chill that rose from the glass pane. Halvor already stood by the hedge, gesturing emphatically though Master Barloc couldn’t see him through the thick greenery.
Mother stood halfway across the courtyard, watching, her arms wrapped over each other across her waist, as though trying to hold herself together. The wind whipped at her skirts and her bun, pulling a few wisps of dark hair free. She looked even smaller than normal with the hedge rising beyond her and the vast peaks cleaving the slate clouds tumbling toward us in the distance.
A tiny, immovable mountain given flesh.
But for just a moment, as I looked down at her, I thought that she looked almost … lost. The burning in my eyes and belly returned with a vengeance as I watched her. The memory I’d had when I’d first walked into the dining salon the first night Halvor had come—of her smiling and laughing, her hair long and loose down her back—rose unbidden and something clenched within me. Inara and I had never been enough, had never been able to make her happy again … but what would it do to her if—when—I found a way and we left her here truly alone? Was it possible to escape? Should I even try? Halvor’s warning about the king’s edict had changed things—would Inara be safer out there, or here, behind the hedge? Even with Mother?
She turned and looked up at the citadel, her eyes going to my window, as if she could sense my gaze on her. I quickly drew back, hoping she didn’t see me.
It didn’t matter, I told myself, forcing the barbed pangs of guilt away and thinking of Inara hurt—asking for me and being refused again and again. Mother had gone too far this time.
And I wasn’t going to let it happen again. Even if it meant facing the world beyond the hedge.
THIRTEEN
I didn’t see Mother again until dinner that night. But when I began to walk toward her, intending to apologize, she turned her back to me, her spine stiffening, and I’d stumbled to a confused and guilty halt. She hadn’t said a word to me during the entire miserable meal. Inara was lost to the roar once more, and Halvor had only focused on his food, silently eating without ever looking up. I’d managed to eat a little, then excused myself to go to bed early, claiming I felt weak—which was true but still felt like a coward’s move.
By the next morning, I’d regained my strength and we bumbled our way into a semblance of our normal routine, though having Halvor there added an element of the surreal to our lives. I did my best to act penitent in my mother’s presence in the morning room, to try and mend what I’d broken, and to allay any suspicion of what I intended to do. But she barely spoke to me—or anyone, for that matter. She’d retreated into a weighted silence that was almost more terrible than her normal domineering demands. I wondered if what I’d said had finally made her realize she’d gone too far this time.
As much as I told myself it didn’t matter, twin needles of guilt and pity pricked at me, puncturing holes in my certainty that leaving was my only option.
And to make matters worse, it rained all morning, trapping us inside, not stopping until long after breakfast finished. As soon as the deluge paused, I stood.
“May I take Inara outside?” I asked, readying myself for her refusal.
Mother just continued to ply her needle, ignoring me entirely. I glanced to Sami, who shook her head slightly. But if she wasn’t going to explicitly tell me no, then I wasn’t about to willingly stay in the morning room with her awful silence pressing in on me. The suspense of her reprisal for my meanness was almost worse than whatever was to come.
Halvor accompanied us outside. I knew he wished to spend more time with Inara, but as the morning went on, we found that she was unpredictable around him. At times she hardly seemed aware he was there, but then she’d unexpectedly grow so agitated she’d begin pulling at her hair and I’d have to send him away to try and calm her.
“You have a soothing effect on her,” he observed just before lunch.
“It’s being outside,” I disagreed, though secretly I was pleased he thought so.
“No, I noticed it this morning, as well. When you would sit with her.”
The rain that had trapped us inside longer than normal had made Inara tense, but there was little we could do besides going out in the downpour. I’d tried everything I could think of, but her mumbling and counting had grown louder and louder and she’d begun to pull at her hair and ears, leaving angry red marks on her skin from her nails. However, she’d quickly calmed afterward as the marks had faded and then disappeared altogether.
“No … it wasn’t me,” I spoke slowly, realization dawning. “It’s because her body is healing itself. She scratched her ears but now the marks are gone.”
Halvor’s eyebrows lifted. “Maybe it wasn’t enough to clear her mind—but it helped calm her down?”
“I think so.”
Inara stood between us, pushing her fingers into the soil around some of her bean plants. I snuck a glance toward the morning room windows, wondering if Mother ever paused in her useless work to look out at us. If she ever wished to join us. I still couldn’t make sense of her continued stubborn silence—and that she’d let me come outside with no argument. I could only attribute it to being unable to stand remaining trapped in a room for hours with Inara.
Or because of the three words that still sat between us, a poisonous hedge of my own making.
“I wish there was something else we could find for her to use her power on. Besides plants and healing.” Halvor’s gaze was on my sister, but I watched him—the way he looked at her, the way he bent his body toward her.
“If only we could get that book back. Maybe it would explain it better. I wonder what my mother did with it.”
Halvor finally looked away from Inara to me. “Do you think she would have put it back or kept it?”
“I have no idea. We could ask Sami if she’s noticed any books in her room.” Even as I said it, I knew it was a futile hope. Mother would have made certain to hide the book—I wouldn’t have put it past her to even destroy it. The thought of all that knowledge gone forever tore at me. I could only hope she wasn’t that spiteful.
Lightning flashed in the distance, illuminating the charcoal clouds momentarily with a jagged pitchfork of brilliant white light. Within moments thunder growled, a long, low bellow, like a thousand hellhounds charging through the blackened sky. Inara shuddered beside me, mumbling something unintelligible. The respite hadn’t lasted long.
“We’re going to have to go back in.” Halvor sounded as disappointed as I felt.
“Maybe we can go to the kitchen and help Sami make luncheon. Come on, Nara.” I gently reached for her hand, turning her from her plants. She startled and looked up, her eyes burning as bright a blue as I’d ever seen. “It’s all right. It’s me. It’s Zuhra.”
“Zuhra … Zuhra,” she repeated softly, my name a thick noise that was barely intelligible. She shook her head, but allowed me to pull her back to the citadel.
“Yes, come on. Let’s go find some food,” I coaxed.
Slowly, we made our way to the kitchen, where Sami was kneading dough, little puffs of flour accentuating each push of her fists. Her cheek and hair were streaked with it, as if she’d forgotten it coated her hands and had pushed an errant strand back in place before remembering. I inhaled deeply, a bit of the tension that tightened the muscles between my shoulder blades loosening as the scents of herbs and fresh bread wafted over us, along with the heat of the fire from the hearth. Of all the places I was “allowed” to go in the citadel, this was my favorite.
“Come to make trouble?” Sami teased as she finished with th
e dough and put it in a bowl to rest and rise. Flour was a rare delicacy for us, something she’d procured on her last trip to the village last winter when supplies had run dangerously low, despite Inara’s plant-growing skills. Sami rationed it religiously. Making bread must have been her way of a peace offering for her part in keeping me locked away—or for what had happened to Inara.
“Never.” I snatched a fat strawberry, the last of the spoils from Inara’s magic that first day Halvor showed up, and plopped it in my mouth before she could stop me. “We thought we’d help you.”
Sami came to Inara’s side and helped guide her to a chair near the prepping table.
“Your help is always welcome. Just so you know, your mother had a headache. She went to lie down.”
“Then can we eat in here, with you?” I asked, eager to stay where it was cozy and warm—and free of my mother’s anger and my guilt.
“I don’t mean to pry, but couldn’t you eat all your meals with us at the table in the other room?” Halvor asked. “Not that I’m complaining—I like it here, too.”
“Sami can eat anywhere she wants.” I bristled at the unspoken accusation.
“I choose not to eat anywhere except my kitchen. If I wished to eat with Mistress Cinnia, I’m sure she would allow it.” It was startling to hear Sami use my mother’s actual name as she ladled out some vegetable soup into three bowls and passed one to each of us. I retrieved a knife and cut a few pieces off one of the steaming loaves of bread sitting on the counter, the crusty bread easily giving way beneath the sharpened blade. Paladin steel—it never dulled.
We ate in quiet for a moment. I savored every bite of the rare treat. Even Inara ceased her mumbling to take a few bites of the bread that I placed in her hand, closing her fingers around it.
“Again, forgive me for my impertinence,” Halvor suddenly spoke up, “but if I’m to live here now … for the foreseeable future … I wish to understand your situations better, if you don’t mind answering some questions.”
Thunder grumbled once more, but there in the kitchen, deep in the belly of the citadel, it seemed distant and almost unreal. The rain came down with such force it pinged off the single window in the room, but it was a mere counterpoint to the cheerful crackle of the fire and the clang of silverware and dishes as we ate. We were cocooned in the safety and warmth of Sami’s domain, where every inch of space was filled with evidences of her love and care. The pots and pans were well worn but polished until they gleamed where they hung above the cast-iron stove. The counters were tidy—every carefully collected herb and spice and ingredient had a place, filling the kitchen with scents and colors of a dizzying array, making it feel full but not cluttered. She was an excellent cook, capable of turning our meager supplies into masterpieces, and I had spent many, many hours with her there, not only cleaning up after meals, but learning to make them as well.
“You may ask, but I can’t guarantee we’ll have all the answers you seek.”
Halvor nodded at Sami’s warning, tearing his slice of bread into smaller pieces as he deliberated. Finally, he asked, “How did you come to be here? I understand that Zuhra and Inara are her daughters—they didn’t have a choice. But how do you fit … that is to say, are you…”
“Their servant?” Mahsami rescued him.
No, I thought immediately, but my stomach clenched in anticipation of her answer. Is that how she saw herself—how she thought my mother saw her?
“I suppose I am, of a sort.”
“No, Sami—”
She continued over my protest, “They arrived in the middle of the night all those years ago. Adelric showed up in Gateskeep the next morning and begged us not to turn them in to the garrisons that regularly came to our village, checking to see if there had been any activity in the citadel. The army relied on us townsfolk to tell them if we’d noticed anything; they didn’t like searching it themselves. When the Paladin rebuilt this place, protections were put in place to guard it, including the hedge, just before the gateway shut for good. Though it was smaller back then, it was still dangerous enough to make even the king’s most formidable warriors afraid of trying to get past it to the citadel. However, if word got out that a Paladin was living there … who knew what the garrisons would have attempted to do. Adelric made promises of peace, to leave us alone, and even bribed those who were hesitant to do as he asked. Eventually, we all agreed to pretend they weren’t there, as long as they kept to themselves. He was only one Paladin, after all—with a human bride … and though we were nervous, we weren’t a bloodthirsty lot.”
I listened silently, hardly even remembering to eat. I’d heard bits of this story before, but she’d never told me this much. A part of me bristled that she was willing to share this story—what should have been my story—with Halvor, when I had asked her so many times over the years to tell me more. But I swallowed my hurt, far more eager to hear more than to voice my discontent.
“They kept their word,” she continued, “and we didn’t see them, other than the few times they braved coming into town for supplies—though it was usually just Cinnia. Adelric rarely left the citadel from what we could tell.”
“But wouldn’t you have at least seen him on his gryphon?” Halvor broke in. “They all had them, and from what I understand they require quite a bit of exercise. So where was his magical beast during all of this?”
I leaned forward, breath caught somewhere between my chest and my throat.
There was a long pause, a pendulum swinging between Sami’s previous refusal to share and whatever had induced her to change her mind today, for Halvor. Finally, she slowly responded, “No, we never saw his.” She glanced out the window, toward the stables visible through the rain. “I asked Cinnia about it—once. We’d never seen a Paladin without a gryphon and we were all wondering if he was somehow hiding his. But she told me they were attacked by a garrison on their way to the citadel, and barely escaped with their lives. His gryphon wasn’t as lucky. She made it sound like the creature sacrificed itself in some way to protect them and allow them to escape.”
Halvor grimaced as he took another bite of soup. I, on the other hand, could only stare at Sami, reeling from her unexpected admission.
I’d occasionally been brave enough to wander through the abandoned stables, wondering about the gryphons that had lived there, dreaming of what it would be like to see one—to ride one. Wondering how it would have felt to run my hands over the feathers on its head and neck; imagining the sound as it swished its leonine tail; picturing myself sitting upon its back, soaring into the sky. It was a different thing altogether to hear Sami speak of it, to admit out loud that my father had a gryphon; that my father and mother had ridden on one—until it lost its life protecting them.
Why had she kept so much of this from me until now? Almost as if she could feel the hurt building within me, she glanced my way as she hurried to continue—perhaps in an effort to keep me from speaking and asking her that very question.
“I knew them better than anyone, because I was the village midwife, but sadly, it still wasn’t much. When Cinnia and Adelric found out they were expecting their first baby, she risked coming to Gateskeep to call on me for help. Which I’m ashamed to admit I was reluctant to give.” She paused, her eyes sad, and when she tried to smile it was a small, rueful upturn of her lips. “Zuhra was a healthy, beautiful baby girl. The birth was easy and I wasn’t needed afterward, so I didn’t see any of them again for months, until the day Cinnia brought you to the village. For some reason, having a baby made her loneliness and seclusion at the citadel that much harder to bear. Despite the risk, she made efforts to reach out, to be my friend, but I rebuffed them all. Everyone did.”
My soup sat forgotten in front of me, turning cold as my cheeks grew warm from these details I’d never known. Only Inara kept eating, her spoon clanking against her bowl, all her concentration needed to focus on eating. But I couldn’t take another bite.
“Why?”
I was grat
eful Halvor was the one asking the questions so that Sami hopefully didn’t notice my shock—and dismay.
She gazed steadily at him but I could see the flush creeping up her neck. “Because of Adelric, her husband. Because we all knew what he was.”
“Even here—so close to their citadel—you’d come to fear and dislike the Paladin.” He shook his head. “They’d protected you. They saved Vamala from the rakasa. Surely those who lived at their feet wouldn’t have forgotten that as easily.”
“The king’s edict made it hard to know what to believe,” Sami said softly.
The death decree that Halvor had mentioned the first night he came to us—the one that made me nervous to still try and escape with Inara. With everything that had happened after that night in the library, I’d never questioned him further about it. I looked to Halvor, hoping for more information, but he was fully focused on Sami. She swept some errant flour off the counter into her hand and then wiped it on her apron. Did he notice the way her fingers trembled? Part of me wanted to go to her, to hug her and tell her it was all right, that she didn’t need to share any more. But I stayed unmoving in my chair, trapped by my own bewilderment and curiosity.
“Even here, in Gateskeep,” she continued, “the rumors reached us—the stories that perhaps the Paladin weren’t as noble as we’d believed. That perhaps they let the rakasa loose on Vamala on purpose, so that they could swoop in on their beasts and save us with their magic, and lord themselves as gods over us. And of course the king’s orders only solidified that fear.”
Halvor nodded, a flash of wistful understanding crossing his face. Understanding I wished I possessed.
“I’d hoped to discover otherwise,” he admitted, “that perhaps the village at the base of their citadel wouldn’t have believed King Velfron’s propaganda.”
I had to gulp down the words Who is King Velfron before I humiliated myself again by revealing a further lack of knowledge about any of this.
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